USA > Minnesota > Polk County > Compendium of history and biography of Polk County, Minnesota > Part 12
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40 | Part 41 | Part 42 | Part 43 | Part 44 | Part 45 | Part 46 | Part 47 | Part 48 | Part 49 | Part 50 | Part 51 | Part 52 | Part 53 | Part 54 | Part 55 | Part 56 | Part 57 | Part 58 | Part 59 | Part 60 | Part 61 | Part 62 | Part 63 | Part 64 | Part 65 | Part 66 | Part 67 | Part 68 | Part 69 | Part 70 | Part 71 | Part 72 | Part 73 | Part 74
74
COMPENDIUM OF HISTORY AND BIOGRAPHY OF POLK COUNTY
which the mill company was seeking to secure. Find- ing that a sufficient amount of boomage rights, as well as necessary yard room for piling and for planing mills and other purposes of the lumber plant, could not be secured, the project was abandoned, and the persons who had come there pretending to be in line to build more mills were found not to have any such intention, but were only speculating out of options and purchases which they had made to sell to the Red River Lumber Company. Thus ended the Grand Forks lumbering operations, after about ten years of operating the mills.
After the Crookston mills had been running for about sixteen years, came the panic of '93. At this time also came the Government sale of the timber on the Red Lake Indian Reservation. As the Red River Lumber Company was the only lumber concern on Red Lake River, Mr. Walker arranged to secure money from the banks in Minneapolis to purchase a sufficient amount of the timber to enable the mills at Crooks- ton to operate for many years. For this purpose he arranged with one of the largest banks of Minneap- olis for sufficient funds to purchase a large amount of the timber, and to do this, he placed several busi- ness accounts, including his own personal account, in this bank, and provided, under an agreement, for the amount of the ten per cent, which each account was allowed to take from the bank, under the banking laws. When panicky conditions came on, and the bank was calling upon its customers, as far as they reasonably could, for payments to meet the withdraw- als of money that the depositors were making, there was one lumber firm in Minneapolis which owned a very favorable tract of timber on the upper Missis- sippi waters. This traet two other prominent lumber firms were anxious to purchase and to take advantage of the stringent times to secure it at only a fraction of its value. Mr. Walker had no interest in either one of these concerns-nor was it any of his particular business, as to the outcome of such sale-but, finding that the president of the bank was forcing the owners to sell for $200,000 property worth $600,000 or
$800,000, he, rather indiscreetly, said to some of the directors of the bank, that it was a shame to saeri- fice the rights of this concern in favor of the wealthier firm that happened to have money to pay, and as that firm owed the bank money, the president was requir- ing the owners to sell and sacrifice for this price. The directors, on the statement of Mr. Walker, did not approve the order requiring them to sell, which so displeased the president of the bank that he called off the agreement to furnish the additional loans that he had agreed to make to Mr. Walker, and also re- quired him to pay up the comparatively small amount which he owed the bank.
At that time of panie the banks were not furnishing money, and were having a close time to meet their own obligations, and so the Red Lake timber sale passed and Mr. Walker did not even attend the sale. Therefore the Shevlin Company, backed by one of the largest concerns in the State, found itself without competition to buy in these lands at a very low rate, and much less than was anticipated. It had been presumed that Mr. Walker would be on hand at the sale to purchase substantially the whole at whatever price was necessary to get it, and at more than any one else could afford to pay. He had some use for the timber, and the others would have to make a be- ginning, and without a sufficient amount to establish mills, they hardly considered it worth while to attend the sale.
Mr. Shevlin, after finding himself in possession of so large an amount of timber, bought out the mills and lumber and the remainder of the timber that Mr. Walker owned on the Clearwater River. In addition to this, he built mills at Thief River Falls, and for a considerable number of years supplied the Red River Valley with lumber and aided very materially in the prosperity of the northwestern part of the state. Mr. Walker then withdrew from that territory and after- ward built mills over at Akeley, Hubbard County, Minnesota, on the headwaters of the Crow Wing River, and has been, up to the present time, quite largely engaged in manufacturing lumber at that
. Thomas :B Haller
75
COMPENDIUM OF HISTORY AND BIOGRAPHY OF POLK COUNTY
point. In the meantime, he sold his milling plant in Minneapolis and for the past sixteen years, has been engaged only in manufacturing at the new townsite of Akeley.
The episode given as the reason for Mr. Walker's abandoning the Red Lake River mills at Crookston, and the sale to Shevlin & Company, is more a per- sonal incident than an historical feature, but may be of interest as an explanation, and as an example of how an incidental or accidental circumstance may turn the current of events into different channels.
EARLY BUSINESS OPERATIONS IN POLK COUNTY, BY E. D. CHILDS, PIONEER.
In the spring of 1877, in company with James Hill, of Warren, Wisconsin, Superintendent W. H. Fisher, of St. Paul, Minn., et al., I visited the Valley of the Red River of the North, making headquarters at Crookston. At this time the other railroads into the Valley were the Northern Pacific, which had been built from Duluth to a point just west of Fargo, and the old St. Paul & Pacifie, which had built two lines, one of whieli, starting from St. Paul, had been completed as far north as Melrose, Minn .; the other starting at Minneapolis, had been completed and was being oper- ated to Breckenridge, Minn. Also, while these were in process of construction, the company building the road brought material from Duluth over the Northern Pacific to Glyndon, and had laid rails as far south as old Barnesville toward Melrose, and also north from Glyndon to what is now Euclid. At this point of con- struction the financial backers of the St. Paul & Pacific were thrown into bankruptcy, all work stopped, and the property defaulting on its interest was thrown into court and J. P. Farley, of the Illinois Central, was named receiver, with W. H. Fisher as superin- tendent.
After Mr. Farley's appointment as receiver, he had interested Norman Kittson, of St. Paul, who was run- ning a line of steamboats from Crookston to Port
Garry (now Winnipeg) on the Red River, induecd him to furnish the funds to take up the track from Crookston to Euclid and relay it to Fisher, thereby enabling the boats to meet the end of the railway without navigating the dangerous stretch of river between Crookston and Fisher.
This was the condition of the railway service on my first visit to Crookston. Our party took the train at Minneapolis, and during the day made our way to Breckenridge where we stopped over night at the old Hyser House. The next morning we hired a team and drove to Fargo, stopping at Fort Abercrombie for dinner, reaching the old Headquarters Hotel at Fargo near nightfall. I distinctly remember that where Wahpeton now stands there was but one house and that was covered with tar paper. The third morn- ing we took train from Fargo to Glyndon, ten miles, and then changed from the Northern Pacific to the St. Paul & Pacific and went aboard a mixed train, which ran tri-weekly during the summer (there were no trains in the winter), from old Barnesville to Fisher. We arrived at Crookston in the afternoon of the third day.
The town at that time consisted of two streets; the main one is now the alley between the Great Northern Depot and the property known for many years as the Fountain & Anglim store, at that time occupied by W. D. Bailey as a general store. The other was a short interseetion of Robert Street from the railway to what is now known as the Routell Block, then occupied by Ross & Walsh as a general store and tin-shop.
During the previous spring Mr. Farley had been greatly hampered in operating the road by the flood waters collecting on the south half of Section 1, just south of the river, and on our return to St. Paul, he proposed to Mr. Hill and myself that if we would buy Section 1 at the agreed price of $2.50 per acre, and hind ourselves to drain it so the water would not be a menace to traffic, he would, "run flat cars under the Crookston depot and locate it and the town on Section 1, moving all their switches and the yards, with other railroad property, to the south side of
76
COMPENDIUM OF HISTORY AND BIOGRAPHY OF POLK COUNTY
the river." We were not ready at that time to accept the offer, and six weeks later, when we went back prepared to enter into the contract, he informed us that in the meantime J. J. Hill and associates had secured control of the properties, and that it was beyond his power to carry out his former proposition.
This trip with our party led to the formation of the firm of Childs, Lytle & Co., consisting of E. D. Childs, W. G. Lytle, and James Hill, and the con- traeting between this partnership and J. P. Farley for 10,000 acres of land of the St. Paul & Pacific Railway grant at the price of $2.50 per acre, or $25,000. This contraet was afterwards ratified by J. J. Hill and his associates and the land selected from the townships of Andover, Fairfax, Lowell, and Angus.
During the summer of 1877 we sent teams from Warren, Wisconsin, to Crookston and broke up 300 acres of land on sections 23 and 24 in the township of Andover, returning the teams to Wisconsin for the winter at the elose of the breaking season. In the spring of 1878 Mr. Lytle and family and myself and family removed to Crookston, where Mr. Lytle still resides (although he retired from the firm in the fall of 1880), and where I remained until the fall of 1907.
We were the pioneers in the wheat business from Ada north, except that Barnes & Tenny, of Glyndon, had bought a few earloads at Crookston during the fall of 1877. They built houses at Rolette, Beltrami, Carmen, and Crookston, and as fast as the road was extended north, after its re-organization as the St. Paul, Minneapolis & Manitoba. Under the firm name of Sterret, IIill & Childs, we built at Fanny, Euelid, Angus, Warren, Argyle, Stephen, Halloek, and St. Vincent; also on the line to the west as far as Grand Forks. At Fisher we went into Capt. Demeres's wheat field eut down a portion of his grain, sufficient for a building site, had the elevator built, and filled with over 30,000 bushels of wheat before a rail was laid to it, so we could load ears.
When at Grand Forks, the very first cars of freight brought in by rail was the lumber for our wheat house.
When we first settled in Crookston, one of the heavi- est drawbacks to immigration was the laek of good water supply for domestic use and during 1878 and 1879 our firm spent much money in prospecting for an artesian supply from below the alkaline deposit. Finally, in company with Corser & Elwood, we im- ported a deep-well contraetor, with his machinery from Minneapolis, and succeeded in establishing two flowing wells in Carmen. An analysis of these waters showed them to be 99.4 per-eent pure water and the residue healthful mineral salts. One of these wells, furnished water for the eity of Grand Forks during the great typhoid epidemie in the decade of 1880, being shipped over in carload lots; but afterwards, when the Carmen elevators burned, this well was choked and has never been opened up; the other well is still in use in the street north of Block 11, Carmen. This demonstration of the existence of an artesian basin of pure water in the Red River Valley was a factor in its development of more than passing in- terest.
In 1880 and 1881 our firm platted and dedicated the townsite of Carmen, now embraced in the Fifth ward of Crookston.
When the city in the early 'SOs was negotiating with T. B. Walker of Minneapolis, asking him to locate a great lumber industry at that point, the dona- tion by our firm, without price, of the land on which the mill and lumberyard were established was a lead- ing factor in influeneing Mr. Walker's decision.
In the church life of the city it was my privilege to be one of the charter members of the First Meth- odist Church, and at a later date, of the Baptist, both in Crookston and Carmen. After the city limits were extended south of the river during different periods I was for fourteen years a member of the City Coun- cil and took part in much of the important legisla- tion of that period, among others had an active part in defeating the $50,000 bond issue, which was sought to be given as a bonus to the Northern Pacific Railroad when it entered the city.
The years 1878 to 1888 were crowded full of activ- ity. We were laying foundations on which those who
PIONEER FIRE FIGHTERS-CROOKSTON'S FIRST VOLUNTEER FIRE DEPARTMENT
FIRST NATIONAL BANK
MERCHANTS BANK ) ** SOM
KE D
BIRD'S-EYE VIEW OF CROOKSTON IN 1885
77
COMPENDIUM OF HISTORY AND BIOGRAPHY OF POLK COUNTY
came later have in many instances builded success- fully. Late in the decade of 1880 my partner, Mr. Hill, made a heavy and most unfortunate investment in a silver mine in New Mexico, which swept away every vestige of his personal fortune. The loss so far undermined the financial condition of our corpora- tion that it took the next fifteen years, and very great sacrifices of our holdings, to pay off the claims result- ing from his unfortunate speculation, and this led to my selling all of our holdings in Minnesota and re- moval, in 1907, to Washington, where I have sinee resided.
GENESIS OF THE PRESENT HISTORY OF POLK COUNTY, WITH A GENERAL DESCRIPTION OF THE COUNTY'S RESOURCES.
BY N. P. STONE, HISTORIAN OF THIE POLK COUNTY OLD SETTLERS' ASSOCIATION.
To the large number of members of the Old Settlers' Association who were not present when the initial steps in the direction of compiling and publishing a personal and general history of Polk County, and es- pecially of its pioneer period, a statement of the op- portunity and circumstances leading to the venture is due. The following synopsis of report of the meet- ing at which this enterprise was launched will give a better view of the spirit and purpose of the old set- tlers than any mere statements.
Persuant to a call issned by John Carter, president of the Old Settlers' Association of Polk County, a meeting was held in the office of O. O. Christianson, at Crookston. At this meeting, in addition to the local members, there were present the Honorable Halvor Steenerson and the Honorable R. J. Montague. Mr. Montague was one of the pioneer attorneys of Crooks- ton, who at one time held the office of county judge, and at another time the office of mayor of Crookston. A few years since, he moved to Virginia, Minnesota, where he is officially known as eity attorney of that enterprising city. Routine business being temporarily laid aside, Judge Montague interested the meeting with a half hour's talk, reviewing many of the im-
portant events in the early history of the county and city, also calling to mind many amusing affairs in the early publie life of the city, recalling and rephrasing stories a third of a century old, illustrating the truth that a good story well told, like old wine, may improve with age.
The sympathy of the meeting becoming largely reminiscent in its attitude, all were ready to hear from Congressman Steenerson, who then addressed the meeting. Mr. Steenerson gave a review of the achieve- ments of the pioneers who came to the Red River Valley leaving old associations, old friends, and even civilization, hundreds of miles behind, to try their fortunes in an untried elimate of long winters of storm and snow, and summers of rain and flood. "These men," said Mr. Steenerson, "are the heroes who have helped build the empire of the Red River Valley, and they are worthy of a place in its history."
Judge William Watts, who has always taken an aetive interest in the early settlement and develop- ment of the valley, having contributed quite largely to a "History of the Red River Valley," published in 1909, next entertained the meeting for a short time, and closed with an endorsement of Mr. Steenerson's suggestion. It being evident that the sentiment of all present was favorable to the proposed history, Mr. Steenerson moved that the Old Settlers' Association compile and print in book form a history of Polk County. The president deelared a unanimous vote in favor of the motion, and it was so recorded.
A few weeks later Mr. Bingham, of W. H. Bingham & Company, historical publishers, of Minneapolis, having become informed of the movement, came to Crookston and ealled on the officers of the association with a view to securing the publishing of the con- templated history. Later he met with the Old Settlers in session and made a proposition, in substance, that his firm would furnish material for the history, with such aid as the Old Settlers could give, and that his firm would furnish such history to the public at a price of $15 per copy. The Old Settlers ratified an agreement of this nature: this agreement being the
78
COMPENDIUM OF HISTORY AND BIOGRAPHY OF POLK COUNTY
warrant under which the publishers have undertaken the work.
GENERAL CONDITIONS OF THE COUNTY.
Preliminary to the general historical features of this work, the writer desires to call the attention of the reader to certain conditions, physical and other- wise, peculiar to Polk County and differing vastly from those found elsewhere in the Red River Valley. If one hundred residents of this eounty were ques- tioned as to the location of Polk County, one hun- dred would answer, "In the Red River Valley," and not one would give the correct answer.
Polk County is geographically centrally located more largely and particularly in the valley of the Red Lake River, than in the valley of the Red River of the North. Red Lake River is the outlet of Red Lake, the largest body of fresh water within the boundaries of any one of the United States of America. This lake is located eentrally in a basin of about two million aeres in the northwestern part of Minnesota, having a large number of small rivers entering the lake from various directions, and but one outlet, the Red Lake River. Red Lake River receives, in addition, the flow of two important rivers : the Clearwater, coming from the southeast and joining Red Lake River at Red Lake Falls, and the Thief River, coming from the north and joining the Red Lake River at Thief River Falls.
The natural physical conditions of the Red Lake River Valley have no harmony with the conditions of the Red River of the North. Red Lake River, after reaching the prairie at Red Lake Falls, has a contin- nous average fall of four feet per mile, to within a few miles of Grand Forks. The Red River of the North, as shown by the records accepted as correet, has an average of only a major fraction of a one-foot ineline per mile from Breckenridge to St. Vineent. A rapid eurrent clarifies the stream, while a slow one tends to a sluggish and unwholesome condition.
The oeeasional floods that have occurred in the Red River are mentioned in the "History of the Red River Valley," published in 1909, as follows: "These floods
attain a height of only a few feet below the level of the adjoining prairie where that is highest, and along the greater part of the distance between Fargo and Winnipeg, the banks are overflowed and the flat land on each side of the river to a distance of two to four miles from it, is covered with water one to five or more feet in depth." Compare the above with the condi- tions found in the valley of the Red Lake River. The Red Lake River flows through a well-defined valley ranging from one-quarter to three-quarters of a mile wide-from the prairie level on one side to that on the other. At Crookston the width is fully three- quarters of a mile. The business part and three- fourths of the residence portion of the city are located between these banks, npon the table lands somewhat peculiar to this river. These table lands vary in height, and generally slope gradually toward the river. The lowest portion of the city has a few resi- denees which have been troubled with the high waters, as had been anticipated at the time of building. The highest water known in Crookston has not risen to a point within twenty feet of the prairie level.
For thirty years the pine logs eut upon the Red Lake Indian Reservation were floated down the Red Lake River to the T. B. Walker sawmill, at Crookston, and manufactured into lumber to be distributed through the Red River Valley for building purposes, furnishing employment to one hundred or more men during the process of manufacture.
The first dam in Crookston was built in the early eighties, and later rebuilt by the Crookston Water- works, Power & Light Company. The power obtained from this dam was used for furnishing light, water, and power for the city. During the past year the Crookston Waterworks, Power & Light Company have, by the addition of another and much larger dam, re- harnessed the water power of the Red Lake River, giving it a capacity for service many times greater than before. This company has a wire already run- ning from their power plant near Crookston to Grand Forks, which will soon be in service furnishing power to that city. Arrangements have also been made for
79
COMPENDIUM OF HISTORY AND BIOGRAPHY OF POLK COUNTY
lighting the town of Fisher from this wire. This eom- pany has established two artesian wells in the City of Crookston, which supply an abundance of pure, whole- some water to the eity. The general absence of any alkaline feature in the water is marked throughout the county, and it is possible to find pure artesian wa- ter of the finest kind in nearly all places where a well is drilled.
It is a well-known fact that the best soil of the Red River Valley is along the river banks, produced by the deposits of silt and elay during the thousand or more years of valley formation. Polk County borders on the Red River a distance of 48 miles, and ineluding the two sides of the Red Lake River, which runs een- trally through Polk County a distance of forty miles, has a total frontage of timber of one hundred and twenty-eight miles length, and an equivalent larger breadth or length of the richest kind of soil. If the statements of the geologists are reliable, Polk County must excel in quality of soil all other eounties in the Red River Valley.
No more fitting recognition of the merits of Polk County, in its relations with the Red River Valley, could have been given than when James J. Hill offered four hundred and ninety-nine aeres of land as site for the State Agricultural College centrally located at Crookston, and no more signal service was rendered the Valley than when Senator A. D. Stephens, then a member of the Legislature, through his aetive' per- sonal effort and influence, seeured the passage of a bill through the Legislature, establishing a school of agriculture at Crookston. The interest in the sehool has been of gradual but continuous growth, until to- day the college, as a Valley institution, has beeome a dominant feature in practical husbandry and kindred branches, with an enrollment of over two hundred students.
The period of actual steamboating on the Red River extended from the time of the completion of the Northern Paeifie Railroad to Moorhead in December, 1871, to the time of the completion of the St. Paul & Pacific from Crookston to St. Vincent, making a con- tinuous all-rail line from St. Paul to Winnipeg, in
1878. The largest number of boats plying the Red River of the North at one time was reported as twelve, according to the History of the Red River Valley, published in 1909. During these years, traffie was frequently suspended owing to low water. After the establishment of all-rail service, steamboating gradu- ally disappeared, until the last boat went out of eom- mission, and the sound of the steamboat whistle is heard no more. The eommereial value of this river described in the above-mentioned history as one of the "two mighty rivers" (referring to the Mississippi and the Red River of the North), today is at zero. Its service to the world was short. It now is only a hazard. Every year of high flood-tide must bring dis- aster of greater or less degree. Red Lake River has a record for safety that ean be trusted. Red Lake River still holds in reserve enough silent foree, when added to that with which it has already been taxed, to amount in round numbers to ten thousand horsepower energy, thus demonstrating its eapaeity of service to Polk County.
In the' matter of railroad transportation and traffie Polk County is again most fortunate. Two trunk lines, the Great Northern and the Northern Pacifie, ineluding branch lines radiating from Crookston, num- bering eight lines of rail traekage in the eity in all, furnish Crookston with an admirable serviee. A large number of traveling salesmen have made their homes in Crookston, finding it a most satisfactory point from which to reach the trade in their territory. The serv- ice given by this system reaches more advantageously to all seetions of the county than the service found in any other county in the eastern half of the Valley.
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.